Virgin Voyage: Risotto

I don’t know what made me think about making risotto. It isn’t even something I usually order at Italian restaurants. But today’s only excursion out of the house led me to Target (a place as dangerous for my wallet as any grocery store) and then to Safeway. I “needed” a few things, among them, aborio rice, bread flour, and macaroni. I came away with 2/3rds of that list and at a red light on the way home found a recipe to work from. 

It bugs my mother that I so seldom follow a recipe the first time I cook it. She likens me to my father in that way. The truth is, initially it started from sheer laziness and sometimes cheap…err…frugality. I’d find that I had some of the ingredients to make a dish but not all, so I’d look at another recipe and have the same problem. I’d marry the two and work around whatever was lacking. 

The first time I remember doing that was with a savory bread pudding. I had bread that I never even had a piece of that was rock hard (and thankfully NOT moldy) and I was determined not to let it go to waste. But there was no heavy cream in my house as required in one place, I don’t recall what was missing from the other recipe whatever it was, it turned out not to matter. I eyeballed the custard, folded in my Italian sausage, cheese, sundried tomatoes, and kale, and put that bread to solid use.

Tonight’s variation sprung from the oyster mushrooms I was determined to buy along with a single portabella cap and the three white mushrooms I had at home. I intended to pull in some dried shitakes as well but got sidetracked before that could happen. I could have purchased more mushrooms but…Just but, there is no real reason I didn’t except I didn’t feel like it. 

So when the Gourmet Mushroom Risotto recipe called for a pound of white mushrooms and a pound of portabella I fudged that a bit on the front end. 

I followed the majority of the middle of the recipe, except I added onions and garlic to the process…but really those are minor changes. But when it came time to finish off tonight’s dish I included shredded dino kale, diced heirloom cherry tomatoes lingering on my counter, and a few leaves of sage. All of which brought in much needed color, some nutritional variety, and a pop of flavor. 

I’m still learning. I’ve been cooking for years but it used to be mostly out of necessity. Now I find myself loving every aspect and wanting to learn more. Tonight’s lesson, sage is stronger than I thought, and those four or five leaves I chopped and integrated into my risotto permeated it in a way I hadn’t anticipated. It wasn’t bad, just stronger than I had anticipated. 

My need for a cooking “fix” strikes me harder and harder each day. This morning I found myself making Chef John’s Buttermilk Biscuits (I stuck to the recipe because, where cooking is art, baking is chemistry) and then folding thyme (my new favorite fresh herb) into my softly scrambled eggs with Romano cheese and cherry tomatoes. That should have sufficed. Instead I found myself stirring broth slowly into a pan of rice waiting for it to transform into risotto at almost 10pm. 

Tomorrow is another day filled with sundry ingredients waiting for transformations of their own. On deck tomorrow: my own version of lactation cookies, lemon bars, lemon cupcakes, and chocolate chip cookies. Let’s see how it all turns out.